Twickenham to make sweeping changes

Twickenham expects to have a new England management team in place by the end of next month and is planning sweeping changes in its elite performance unit after another season of Six Nations woe.

England's head coach Andy Robinson met the Rugby Football Union chief executive Francis Baron yesterday to discuss a second successive Six Nations campaign that yielded three defeats and two victories and outline the changes he felt were necessary to enhance England's chances of retaining the World Cup in France next year. The world champions have dropped to sixth in the International Rugby Board's world rankings, behind two European teams, France and Ireland.

The RFU's management board will consider its response to Robinson's vision of the future next month. Among the changes already being considered are the appointment of a director of rugby, whose chief remit would be to establish working relations with the Premiership clubs, and a shake-up of Robinson's backroom staff. Robinson's former rugby league coaches Joe Lydon and Phil Larder and the performance director Chris Spice would be particularly vulnerable.

The Six Nations campaign reflected a season of turmoil off the field. The clubs and the RFU were bound for the high court last month after a public disagreement about the management and control of elite players, but the governing body is ready to offer the hand of peace to the clubs.

The RFU's chief executive Francis Baron and the chairman of the union's management board Martyn Thomas are planning to meet their Premier Rugby counterparts Mark McCafferty and Tom Walkinshaw to discuss a policy of handling elite players up to and beyond the World Cup.

That proposed meeting is one of the reasons that senior Twickenham figures believe that the return of Sir Clive Woodward, the 2003 World Cup-winning head coach, to Twickenham in a senior management position would destroy any prospect of a rapprochement with the clubs, who were cited by Woodward as one of the reasons for his resignation in the autumn of 2004 because of their refusal to accede to his demands over issues such as player release dates.

With the RFU accepting that some of the aims outlined in its strategic plan last year, such as central contracts, are unattainable, it is considering reforming its elite performance unit and appointing a director of rugby, or team manager, as part of its attempt to build bridges with the clubs.

Ideally, it wants someone who has a club background and the name of Simon Halliday, the former Bath and England centre, has been mentioned. The presence of a director of rugby would allow Robinson to concentrate on coaching and divorce him from the politics of the game. He has already told clubs that senior players who went on the Lions tour last summer, such as Martin Corry and Steve Thompson, will be rested from this summer's tour to Australia, with the squad set to have a younger average age than that of the trusted faithfuls who served in the Six Nations.